Experimental investigation on an integrated thermal management system with heat pipe heat exchanger for electric vehicle

Zou, Huiming; Wang, Wei; Zhang, Guiying; Qin, Fei; Tian, Changqing; Yan, Yuying

Abstract

An integrated thermal management system combining a heat pipe battery cooling/preheating system with the heat pump air conditioning system is presented to fulfill the comprehensive energy utilization for electric vehicles. A test bench with battery heat pipe heat exchanger and heat pump air conditioning for a regular five-chair electric car is set up to research the performance of this integrated system under different working conditions. The investigation results show that as the system is designed to meet the basic cabinet cooling demand, the additional parallel branch of battery chiller is a good way to solve the battery group cooling problem, which can supply about 20% additional cooling capacity without input power increase. Its coefficient of performance for cabinet heating is around 1.34 at −20 °C out-car temperature and 20 °C in-car temperature. The specific heat of the battery group is tested about 1.24 kJ/kg °C. There exists a necessary temperature condition for the heat pipe heat exchanger to start action. The heat pipe heat transfer performance is around 0.87 W/°C on cooling mode and 1.11 W/°C on preheating mode. The gravity role makes the heat transfer performance of the heat pipe on preheating mode better than that on cooling mode.

Citation

Zou, H., Wang, W., Zhang, G., Qin, F., Tian, C., & Yan, Y. (2016). Experimental investigation on an integrated thermal management system with heat pipe heat exchanger for electric vehicle. Energy Conversion and Management, 118, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2016.03.066

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Mar 24, 2016
• Online Publication Date: Mar 31, 2016
• Publication Date: Jun 15, 2016
• Deposit Date: Mar 3, 2017
• Publicly Available Date: Mar 3, 2017
• Journal: Energy Conversion and Management
• Print ISSN: 0196-8904
• Electronic ISSN: 0196-8904
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 118
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2016.03.066
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/795154
• Publisher URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0196890416302035